"I think this offseason he'll get things ironed out and get back to the place he wants to be," Hudson said Tuesday. "In coming years, people will look back on this year with him and laugh about it."

Hudson has some experience signing a big contract, losing velocity, hearing that he was a bust before rebounding. Granted, the four-year, $47 million deal he signed with Atlanta after leaving the A's in 2004 was not nearly as fat as Zito's $126 million deal. Just the same, Hudson took a lot of heat during his second season here in 2006 when he stopped winning and his ERA rose by more than a point over 2005.

Hudson said some of his problems were mechanical.

"It takes a little bit of tinkering to figure out," he said. "It took me a whole year of backing up third last year. It wasn't fun. For the first time in my career, I saw that my teammates didn't have confidence in me. That was really frustrating for me."

Hudson said he rededicated himself to his physical conditioning over the winter and changed some of his workouts. During batting practice Tuesday, Hudson and Zito chatted for a few minutes and Hudson showed Zito some of the exercises that he believes have helped him rebound. Hudson takes a 13-5 record and 3.01 ERA into tonight's game against the Giants.

"I just want him to know that it's going to get better. It's just a tough time right now, and it seems like a big mountain to climb, but I think he'll be fine.

"You want to come in and obviously do great for your new team and your new teammates. If you kind of stumble a little out of the gate, when it happened to me, my confidence took a little hit and it snowballed on me a little bit. It took me a little while to get over that. Now it's all behind me, and things are on the up and up for me. I'm sure that's probably a little bit of what he's going through."

So many euphemisms my head spins. I think that "Hudson showed Zito some of the exercises" is probably my favourite. :P Also, overall it sounds like he's trying to help Zito overcome erectile dysfunction.

Covered 3 sports here and ignoring the 4th because, umm, I like Jason Richardson and I get to be emotional and irrational because I'm not invested enough in the team for good trades or whatever to make things better. :P

I caved and made a dedicated 49ers icon. *shamefaced* I got really excited about Alex Smith being comfortable and confident and making plays, and like, I have so much hope for all the new boys and I'm really excited to watch them play. I mean, I entirely expect bungles and stuff, but I'm hoping for good moments to go with the bad. :)

It's a game show that is in reruns on ESPN Classic. And this ep is particularly hysterical. It's when Zito was w/the A's; don't remember who his teammate was but yeah. The question (or very close to it) was: "what part of your teammate's body is out of proportion?" You'd expect something like "big feet" but no. *Whole* lotta discussion about those hips, oh yeah. The words "curvy and voluptous" were also mentioned. XD I mean really, the fic just writes itself.

LOL! I know, I was in stitches the whole time. I mean, his teammate seemed *genuinely* fixated on those hips, to the point where the host was "ok, we get it already. enough w/the 411." Yeah, very seldom do you have such a golden mpreg-fic opportunity show up.